


Enjoy the Silence

by alittlebriton



Category: Alias (TV)
Genre: Gen, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-12 15:44:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4485275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlebriton/pseuds/alittlebriton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sark's death, rebirth and death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enjoy the Silence

He had been silent as he stood by the grave, silent as they laid his mother to rest. The rain drummed a changing beat on the closed black coffin. When Irina came to usher him away and into the waiting car, he had barely glanced at her, just followed a stranger into the back of the black sedan. She wondered if he was used to this, or whether he was mourning his mother so much that he didn’t care what happened to him.

She wasn’t sure if she wanted to know the answer.

The solemn 12-year-old had simply stared out the window the entire way to her house, and then had simply stared at her through her explanation of why she was taking care of him from now on. When she had addressed him by his name, his eyes showed something other than dullness for the first time.

“My name is Sark”, is all he said, and Irina knew she had chosen wisely.

* * *

Barely 17 and he has already killed 41 people. He is second only to Khasineau in Irina’s organisation, but they all know he’s prettier. He likes killing with a silenced Glock, the gun heavy in his hands and his body far away from their’s. In and out through a window, the assassin in shades of grey, ropes dangling from a tool belt. Melting into the shadows and seeming to not take up any space.

Irina has yet to let him out in the open, but he knew it was only a matter of time. He has learned to choose his moments wisely. In that way, he mirrors her exactly. When they appear together before her other associates, he knows how they look. A doting family. Employer and drudge. Whichever you want to believe. When they want to, they resemble a coiled cobra ready to strike, and if Irina’s venom perturbs him, he never says a word.

* * *

He roars into the open with a shotgun at the age of 19. A fitting weapon for the noise Irina wants him to make. After that first time, he goes back to silencers, but now he has other options. An AK47 here and there, a well-timed explosion. Disturbing the piece isn’t a problem. Irina gives him her blessing to harm with his demands. He likes to think his insistence on the delivery of Sloane felt like a bullet wound to Sydney. He wonders if she ever runs her fingers over that scar.

* * *

His laughter in the cell sounds harsh, like machinegun fire hitting a wall, echoing. His disavowal, his silence on her disappearance is a taunt, one calculated to allow her to continue to hate him. If he speaks again, it won’t be to her. If he was a US citizen, he could now legally drink. He isn’t surprised with the CIA don’t let him toast his birthday with a good bottle or two.

* * *

When he meets his father again, after 16 years, he wants to be as close as possible to the burning flesh, the flame searing and sputtering. He closes his eyes at the pleasure of hearing the crackle of skin that will never heal.

With Lauren, he wants to use close weapons. It is all very well shooting someone, but if you want to make it personal, go for the knife. It’s what he told Alison. He slides blades between ribs, across throats. He slides his hands across her soft skin and feels the flutter of her pulse. With her, he lets himself moan.

In the cell, only a few scant months later, he wishes he kept his mouth shut. For the first time, he has been inappropriately verbose. It costs him more dearly than he knows, just then.

* * *

He uses the only weapons he has. “She loved me.” The truth is sometimes the unkindest wound of all. It never scars, never heals. He blindsides Vaughn with his honesty, and hopes it makes him hurt like the torture never did. At 23, he calls out, drawing a truce with his words. Making his escape with another truth.

* * *

Sex has always been used against others, since the dawn of time. It is especially true for spies - nothing makes you drop your guard like an innocent looking blonde. He should probably remember that in future. She hates being deceived, he can tell, even if it worked to her advantage. She doesn’t care that the moment was sincere.

He wonders if she knows that his generosity hurt the CIA more than his mercenary nature ever would. So black and white, their view that terrorists couldn’t be selfless. Most of the time they are right. But he likes to keep them on their toes. His gift to them, and their allowing him to leave quietly, makes them sweat. Makes them anticipate when the axe will fall. At the age of 24, he lets them stew.

* * *

He sees Irina for the first time since she let him rot in a cell for two years. He doesn’t bother to tell her that he didn’t know her sister was behind the Covenant, doesn’t tell her that when he heard she was dead, he flew out of his way to find her resting place. It cost him over half a million dollars in a job, but he had to pay his respects. He stood, with his head bowed, at the mausoleum in Moscow. Whispered a prayer in Russian and left. There was nothing more to be said.

And of course their first meeting would entail her pulling a gun on him. Why she thinks he wants to harm her, he doesn’t know. He forgave her a long time ago, when he realised he would have done the same. But her eyes flash warnings and he lets his body language tell her that he is not a threat. He just wants to leave.

Nearing 25, he watches as she nods at him, then walks out of the room to give herself up to the CIA, Rambaldi’s endgame finally stopped by her daughter.

* * *

He’s almost expecting her. He recognises her tread on the floorboards, but dismisses it. He concentrates on not crying out. He focuses on the body slumped in the chair in the corner, still twitching, as if Sloane is trying to warn him. He falls to his knees gracelessly for the first time in his life. The last time in his life.

She appears as a ghost, whispers into the room on light feet. She pays no attention to anyone of the corpses littering the floor, even though she sent him there to kill the last remaining threads of her life. She steps around his blood and calls him by his name.

“My name is Sark” he breathes, and Irina knows she chose wisely.

* * *

She watches as they lower his body into the frozen earth. January in England is too cold for funerals. At 28, he is buried in an unmarked grave where he was reborn, as he requested. In the silence, the earth lands on his coffin with a thud, and she wrinkles her nose at the inelegance of death. She walks to her car without a word.


End file.
